Derek Lowe's commentary on drug discovery and the pharma industry. An editorially independent blog from the publishers of Science Translational Medicine. All content is Derek’s own, and he does not in any way speak for his employer.

Posts tagged with "The Scientific Literature"

The Scientific Literature

Last month I mentioned that a professor at Wayne State, Fazlul Sarkar, was thinking of suing the PubPeer site or its commenters, after a host of negative comments on his papers disrupted his move to the University of Mississippi. Well, he’s making good on that threat, according to Retraction Watch. The court papers have all… Read More

Biological News

The authors of the ACS Nano paper on using electromagnetic fields to produce stem cells have responded on PubPeer. They have a good deal to say on the issues around the images in their paper (see the link), and I don’t think that argument is over yet. But here’s what they have on criticisms of… Read More

The Scientific Literature

While we’re on the topic of the literature, I see that PNAS has made some changes to their system: Although the largest number of submissions to PNAS are through the Direct Submission route, there continues to linger a general perception that to publish a paper in PNAS, an author requires sponsorship of an NAS member. Read More

The Scientific Literature

Here’s an interview with Nobel winner Randy Schekman, outspoken (as usual) on the subject of the scientific literature. This part caught my attention: We have a problem. Some people claim that important papers cannot be replicated. I think this is an argument that has been made by the drug companies. They claim that they take… Read More

The Scientific Literature

There had been talk of some sort of trouble brewing via PubPeer, the open-source post-publication review site, and this appears to be it. There’s more on the issue at Science: Farzul Sarkar at Wayne State is suing, if he can find the right people to sue. The issue first came to light in August, when… Read More

Academia (vs. Industry)

I wanted to mention that there’s an interesting symposium on “Irreproducibility in Target Validation” taking place at Novartis (Cambridge, MA) next month, October 23. This is a topic that many an industrial biopharma researcher can relate to, and as academic centers get into more drug research, they’re joining the rueful par… Read More

The Scientific Literature

Big high-impact journals have more retractions, it seems. I can see how that would be, because there are several forces at work. People want to publish their splashy, cutting-edge results in the big-name journals, and a higher percentage of those papers are wrong to start with, as opposed to more incremental ones. And the big… Read More

The Scientific Literature

It’s time for a hang-heads-in-shame moment. This is another off the Twitter feed, and the only place to see the figure in its native state is to go the the Chemical Reviews table of contents and scroll down to the article titled “Aqueous Rechargable Li and Na Ion Batteries”. A perfectly reasonable topic, but take… Read More

The Dark Side

Retraction Watch has a rare look behind the peer review curtain in the (now notorious) case of the STAP stem cell controversy. This was the publication that claimed that stem-like cells could be produced by simple acid treatment, and this work has since been shown to be fraudulent. Damaged reputations, bitter accusations, and one suicide… Read More

Academia (vs. Industry)

A reader sends along this paper, on some small molecules targeting the C2 domain of coagulation factor VIII. It illustrates some points that have come up around here over the years, that’s for sure. The target is not a particularly easy one: a hit would have to block the interaction of that protein domain with… Read More